


Should have let it burn

by Mirdala



Series: Blackwatch Week 2018 [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Blackwatch Era, Blackwatch Jesse McCree, Child Soldiers, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Original Character Death(s), Past Soldier: 76 | Jack Morrison/Reaper | Gabriel Reyes, implied - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-22
Updated: 2018-06-22
Packaged: 2019-05-26 17:04:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15005396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mirdala/pseuds/Mirdala
Summary: Blackwatch Week Day 5Order/ChaosAfter an agent dies, Reyes thinks back on the chaos he has been trying to put back into order. And thinks...maybe it isn't worth it.





	Should have let it burn

**Author's Note:**

> All sorts of out of order....oh well! Still trying to catch up >_<

I’m half watching the news. Mostly just staring at the screen, images washing over my mind but not seeping into it. It’s the same shit, just like every other damn day. It’s not like I can or should be surprised by it all. I pause as I lift a glass to my lips. Truly how could I be surprised. Humanity has always been the bringer of its own chaotic destruction. The scotch burns softy into my nostrils. The great Gabriel Reyes, hero of the Crisis, can’t be surprised when things go to shit once the war that brought humanity together ends.

I remember talking to Jack about it one night, after the treaty ceremony, before he is named Strike Commander. Back when we would stand shoulders touching, one of us leaning into the other or both leaning into each other. I remember telling him, I hoped this would get people to pull their acts together. That in the ending of its potential extinction, mankind would get their heads out of their asses and ban together. Unite. Create order. Jack said it would. That with Overwatch being a beacon of light and hope, humanity would come together finally. Rebuild and grow into something better. Order coming from the end of war’s chaos.

I listened.

I shouldn’t have.

He was shitfaced.

Now almost ten years later, things have just gone back to normal. Cartels, drug rings, arms and human trafficking, now with versions mingling in Omnics. Sighing I take a deep drink, emptying the glass. I’m still making a difference I suppose. Righting the stupidity that is human nature. Pushing back the chaos. Shutting down criminal rings. After Deadlock, the Shimada empire was next in line. I sent Foss to handle it, took a good while but the mission was finally completed. I’m sure it won’t be long before an Omnic group pops up. They are second class citizens at best in some places. Hate from a five-year war is hard to turn off. I remember my mother talking about the wars she grew up with when I told her I was joining. It wasn’t to dissuade but to inform. There’s always another war to fight. Order is never maintained.

But that’s for another day to think about. Today, tonight is about the completed mission that cost the life of a single agent. One of my first agents. My first attempt to shove the chaos left in the wake of the war into some semblance of order.  A foolish hope.

I dragged that hope with me into Blackwatch. I adapted quickly, learned chaos couldn’t be shaped into order but it could be contained. Maybe balanced. If I was methodical. If I was smart enough. If I was conceited enough. Having been through the Crisis I fully believed I could do it.

The horrors of the Crisis almost pale in comparison to the atrocities of today. I pour another three fingers worth of scotch into my glass. When looking at mangled bodies, I rationalized it, reasoned that flesh and bone would never be able to withstand the harshness of metal. This is what happens when soft gooey things go against hard unrelenting steel. But seeing the things humans could do to other humans still astonished me. I mean, I caught glimpses of it, the ruthlessness of people pushed into survival. From the routine of civilized life to the lawlessness of war. Finding bodies of people beaten to death over food and water. The charm of devils promising safety for a nefarious fee. While there were sympathizers for the Omnics, what was just as bad were those who were so determined to end the Omnic Crisis they didn’t care how they did it or what it did to those who survived.

I never forgot the time when the team and I ran into the group Foss was raised by. God what a shit show. Most of the adults in the town had died. Conscripting preteens and young adults to fill the gaps in their forces. The kids damn near feral. Their leaders had shined with pride. But at the time I was dealing with bigger things. End of the world things. I should have dealt with what I saw at the time.

The best I could do after the fact was to go back and snatch up who I could. Place them in some semblance of an ordinary life, knowing in peace time those kids would not be able to cope. I found guerrilla fighters turned underground fighters, muscle for hire, weapons to be aimed by other with no choice in the matter. Foss was the only one who made it. I didn’t want to be the same as those people. Who used the chaos in someone’s soul against them.

I look to my side and Jesse is passed out in the plush chair. His uniform is rumpled now. The funeral over hours ago. He’s so young. Sometimes I forget it. Get caught up in his cocky confidence and unnatural skill with a revolver. With his ability to blend in almost anywhere and smooth talk anyone that it makes me feel like he has been doing this for years. I suppose he has in a way.

Since he was a child.

Doing what he had to, to stay alive.

I’m sure this isn’t the first time he’s had a friend die. I gave him and Foss the same deal. They were going to get an education. They were going to be given the opportunity to have a normal life. To show them there was more to life then struggling. It was up to them to decide what they wanted to do next. But they were both fighters. And they saw the building chaos in this time of peace. They wanted it gone or at least contained, just like I did.

And look at where it got me. I rub a hand over my face.

Maybe if I had just let everything run its course…

Maybe I was wrong… there couldn’t be a balance.

I raise my glass, toasting to the photo on the holoscreen. I’m standing with Foss and McCree on either side of me, a birthday party for McCree. 

On nights like this though, I allow myself to regret saving the human species.

Of trying to create order out of chaos.

Should have let it burn.

**Author's Note:**

> I hc that Gabe has made BW a band of misfits he picked up along the way. He adopted strays. He wants the best for them but will let them make the choice rather than make it for them. Using this week as a way to flesh out parts of another WIP fic. 
> 
> Cheers.


End file.
